Illinois Valley Times

It is the rush that D'Angelo Pryor likes the most about basketball.

Pryor, a 6-foot-4-inch senior guard-forward for Streator Township High School, was asked what part of the sport he excels in that he cherishes most. The rush to which he was referring is the excitement a player gets after scoring a basket.

“And I just love that,” he told the Illinois Valley Times.

In that case, there has been a lot to love in Pryor's game this season. Through Dec. 14, according to Streator's statistics page on www.maxpreps.com, Pryor had scored 109 points through the Bulldogs' first seven games of the season, for a 15.6 points-per-game average – the team high through that point and almost twice as much as the next Bulldog.

Scoring was just one area in which Pryor was at or near the top of the team. He also topped the squad in rebounds, with 64 (9.1 per game) and blocked shots, with eight (1.1 per game), and he tied for the lead in steals, with six, while being a close second in assists, with 18 (2.6 per game).

Streator Head Coach Beau Doty told the Illinois Valley Times that Pryor's impact on the team is immeasurable.

"He can affect the game in so many ways -- defensively, on the boards, in transition, in the post, handling the ball and scoring from inside and out,” Doty said. “He is one of our most unselfish players, always looking to create scoring opportunities for teammates, and he also leads our team in charges drawn. When your best player has those qualities, it is infectious to the rest of the team and creates an environment where we can be successful as a group."

Through those first seven games, Pryor had improved on his breakout season of the 2015-16 campaign, when he led the team with averages of 14.4 points and seven rebounds over 31 games. The season before that, as a sophomore, Pryor had averages of 2.9 and 2.6, respectively, in 31 games played.

Pryor has had a strong upward trajectory for a player who reluctantly got into the sport when he began in fifth grade.

“I didn't want to do it,” he said. “My mom actually made me do it, but I ended up liking it after that.”

Since being on the junior-varsity team as a freshman, Pryor said he has expanded his game. He has gone from being a post player to being able to bring the ball up the floor and improving his jump shot.

Pryor said the season was going “really great so far” through the first seven games.

“There's always room for improvement, though,” he said. “I just have to work on keeping my head up and staying positive.”

The team seemed to move upward with Pryor's improvement, going from 14-17 last season to a 5-2 start this season. Pryor said a big difference from last season is that there are more players with varsity experience, whereas the 2015-16 team relied on a lot of sophomores who were pretty new to the varsity level.

As far as his post-high-school plans, Pryor is talking to Milwaukee Area Technical College about playing there.